go on as they are. So terrible is the state of things, so heavy the
taxation, that in many towns all trade is suspended. In Brussels,
I hear, Alva's own capital, the brewers have refused to brew, the
bakers to bake, the tapsters to draw liquors. The city swarms with
multitudes of men thrown out of employment. The Spanish soldiers
themselves have long been without pay, for Alva thinks of nothing
but bloodshed. Consequently they are insolent to their officers, care
little for order, and insult and rob the citizens in the streets.
Assuredly something must come of this ere long; and the people's
despair will become a mad fury. If they rise, Constance, and my
father does not say nay, I will assuredly join them and do my best.

"I do not believe that the queen will forbid her subjects to give
their aid to the people of the Netherlands; for she allowed many to
fight in France for Conde and the Protestants against the Guises,
and she will surely do the same now, since the sufferings of our
brothers in the Netherlands have touched the nation far more keenly
than did those of the Huguenots in France. I am sixteen now, and
my father says that in another year he will rate me as his second
mate, and methinks that there are not many men on board who can pull
more strongly a rope, or work more stoutly at the capstan when we
heave our anchor. Besides, as we all talk Dutch as well as English,
I should be of more use than men who know nought of the language
of the country."

Constance shook her head. "I do not think, Ned, that our father
would give you leave, at any rate not until you have grown up into
a man. He looks to having you with him, and to your succeeding
him some day in the command of the Good Venture, while he remains
quietly at home with our mother."